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Name Magic
Gifted to the Gypsy Clans by the Stitched One, Name Magic is not exclusive to the clans, though it is extensively used by them. Name Magic is the art of using True Names to, in layman's terms, convince objects and people to do your bidding. It is often contrasted with Cabalism, the knowledge of the Worth of objects, and causing them to act through that knowledge. The True Names of things Levels of Naming Naming things is a hierarchal procedure, with each level granting more and more power and control over the named thing. The Workaround If you do not know the Name of something, don't fret, there's a way around that. The phrase: "That which is touched by the speaker within the next second is hereby called -" will work in place of the actual Name. It is the least powerful method, and will do absolutely nothing to sentient creatures that they don't actively assist with. It is enhanced somewhat by using your own True Name, but is only used by complete novices or when referring to something never before encountered. It can be used as a way of "locking-on" to sentient enemies in order to throw objects at them. Of course: "That, over there" will work in a pinch, but it has the same level of power of a five-year-old moving things. The Ideal There is a name for object types, mostly specified by their use. "Table," "Chair," "Human," "Skridae," "Tree," "Bird," "Fish," all are usable to refer to things. This is more powerful than the Workaround, and fairly flexible too. This allows phrases such as: "The Table cracks," "The Chair is cleaned," "The Dwarf is hurt." That last one inflict minor wounds. If someone is sitting on a table, though, it will be referred to as a chair for the duration. Note: "Abomination" exists, but will only work for things that have delved deeply into the worst sorts of magic. Spaederlings and Caeder Crawlers can be referred to this way. It was thought that perhaps the Stitched One might be callable with this Name, but nobody has been stupid enough to try without something stopping them. (Once there was a human attempting to summon abominations with this Name, and s/he was only stopped from calling the Stitched One this way by a small Treant smacking him/her in the face with a large fish. It is, however, a story told to children) The Locative This is a more specific version of the Ideal Naming convention, this convention uses the location in space and time of an object or being. "The Table next to me," "The Fountain at the corner of Amaranth and Bach in Cantor in Porchiis," and "The Human of Brynnewald of The Black Forest of Itaedia who is right now next to me in Zavak" are examples of sentences with increasing levels of specificity. To move inanimate objects, this is as complicated as one needs to be. Any single object is more or less movable with this convention, though things with other things in them tend to need the stronger conventions. One can move an empty building this way, but cannot as easily move a pocketwatch. Using this to damage or heal sentient creatures can range from healing/inflicting light to moderate wounds, depending on specificity. Good luck managing "Itaedia," instead of "World," though. True Names - Personality This is exclusively a sentient creature convention. It calls a being by the version of their True Name that is a distillation of their personality down to a few words and ideas. Most people who know their True Name know this version of it. All Oaths are usable this way, and more serious wounds and commands may be dealt/removed this way. True Names - Component Parts This is widely considered as the deepest normal individuals are able to go with Name Magic. It solves the Locative problem of being unable to move watches and ant colonies by referring to what, exactly, makes up the Named object or person. The power increases based on how many of the Component Parts can be Named and are included, and if the speaker can name the proportions of each. At this point Name Magic intersects with Cabalism. A beach is the typical example given for using this technique. To properly Name a beach, you must indicate how it reacts to the elements, all the minerals in it, the body of water it is near, and what creatures inhabit it. If you specify the exact chemical makeup of the creatures inhabiting the beach, you will be able to move the beach. All of it. Not as far as you can see, all of it. Every part of the beach up until that beach changes in composition in some significant way is now movable and transformable. Based on level of complexity, this ranges from the ability to move most anything you can see, to being able to alter and move locations. To properly Name a human, you must indicate where s/he is from, what they are doing now, how they react to most things, (if possible include how they think), the chemicals that make up their muscles, bones, nerves, organs (including the brain), how their organs react to various stimuli, and the proportions of all of these components. There are Ideal Names for flesh, blood, bone, and the organs, and the average proportions are known or discoverable, but to gain near-absolute control over a sentient creature you need to be more specific. Using the ideal Names will give you the ability to inflict and heal pretty much any kind of wound, while the max specificity will allow you to change the sentient creature's Name to suit your purposes. If there are any Name Magic users who can use Component Parts to its fullest, they are unknown. As is, the strongest Name Magic users are seemingly immortal old Gypsies who typically don't bother doing much of anything important. True Names - Theoretical Level If one knows the True Names of the atoms that make up chemicals as well as those of the four other fundamental forces, one could specify an object or being by the proportion of elements instead of the, admittedly very long-winded, versions required by Component Parts. Names of elements have been recorded, but they don't quite work. Calling to a space filled only with hydrogen gas by the name "Hydrogen" works at a level somewhere between Locative and Component Parts, depending on how small of a space the gas is confined to. It is hypothesized that perhaps there are Personality components to the Name of elements, but direct conversation with elements has not yet been achieved in a consistent way. The only practical example is a scholar mage who once managed to describe keratin this way and cured his baldness instantly. He was unconscious for two weeks and woke up having forgotten several hundred Names. It is assumed that this level of Naming would be able to bind large amounts of sentient creatures, up to and including towns. Add in Personality Naming and one would be able to bind a god. Theoretically. Getting the Name of Inanimate Objects Go to the local Gypsy clan and they will know the Ideal Names of every object you might encounter in your area. Getting taught all these things will cost quite a bit, though. Locative is not often taught, and more often done by trying to say the Name of a street repeatedly until something works. Getting the Name of Sentient Creatures Most scholars or Gypsies will know the Ideal Name for various races, though the one for Gypsies, "Those-Who-Take-In-Outcasts" refuses to work for anything besides Ideal level sentences. Well, unless you're a Gypsy or a very good (read: oath-bound) friend to a clan. If you know Name Magic, it's possible to come up with the Personality True Names for yourself and your closest friends and family by trying many different combinations of words that would fit with the help of the person you're trying to Name. There are also a couple rituals designed to do this, mostly oath-bindings of various sorts. With years of guessing people's names (or a ridiculously high perception and charisma score), one can probably do a Component Parts version of a sentient creature's Name from interacting with them a little bit, such as the interaction found in politics or combat. It is considered rude and unethical to do this, however, and is reserved for defensive combat, generally. Sentences Grammar (Un?)fortunately, grammar in Name Magic is based almost entirely on the language one uses to think with. Multilingual Name Magic users describe themselves as being able to switch from thinking in one language to thinking in another, and Name Magic neatly following along. Strangely, knowing how to use articles, verbs, and various other grammatical components in a coherent way in your native language allows you to use them in Name Magic. Nobody has ever been able to pinpoint what "the" is in Name Magic, written or spoken. There are several more politically-inclined Nommancy users who have developed a formal version of Name Speech, which relies significantly on using only grammar and not indicating any relationships that aren't in the speaker's favor. Instead of asking a favor with "Would you do this for me?" the formal would go: "Speaker asks this of spoken to." Exactly how badly mis-speaking will fuck you up One of the unfortunate parts is that you have to deal with godawful grammar in languages like English, Latin, German, Chinese, Japanese, and so on. What's the difference between "You're hurt" and "Your hurt" in English-based Name Magic? One inflicts injuries or indicates them, the other gives your opponent a wide-area injury attack to use. What happens if you try to split an infinitive in Latin? At best the spell fizzles out, possibly while mocking you, at worst things start exploding. What happens if you try to say "divided by zero" in any version of Name Magic? You get consumed by the Void. The instant you finish your sentence. It's rather horrifying. Spells Oaths Companionship One of the more common types of Name Magic throughout Itaedia, these are often used in weddings. While some are indeed strictly binding, generally companionship oaths aren't actually able to force anyone to continue to be friends or lovers or whathaveyou. Instead, they make spending time with the other person just a bit more noticeably enjoyable (at random points and only a little, but it's enough to always keep it fresh), and reduce how angry you get with them just a little bit (the "they're your friend, relax" that most people use to re-think how angry they are becomes a little bit more noticeable, but only when the person is actively trying to forgive). These are often used in the Gypsy clans to keep everyone from killing each other. Binding Actions Certain oaths are done in such a way as to demand that someone do something. There are often punishments indicated for failing to follow through, or benefits for succeeding, and unrelenting determination is even more often a part of the oath. Used in the Blood Escalation curse to create zombie berserkers in the event of the user's death, they are often used to increase productivity. "I'm gonna do this right now" has made many a Gypsy student or farmer far more successful than they might otherwise have been. Coercive Oaths As with anything, there are those who seek to force others to do their bidding. Lords have been known to teach their subjects Name Magic purely to swear to do whatever they say. This backfires most times, as anyone who knows Name Magic automatically knows most verbs and articles, not the least of which is "no." Further, "I don't want to do x anymore" will break most oaths. Wedding oaths are a little harder to break because of the emotional component, and that they often include a counseling component, but generally an oath taken due to coercion lasts about as long as the person who swore wants it to. This can lead to some very impressive trickery to make people swear oaths that rob them of the memory of the coercion, or tricking them into wanting to swear an oath, and things like that. Of course, the biggest problem is that "I unbind you of all oaths you were coerced into" will break any of these oaths should the speaker know their True Name and the target's True Name equal to or better than the person who coerced the target into an oath in the first place. Defensive While typically done with runes, Name Magic can be used to create some very effective armor. The problem is that saying "such and ''such ''won't harm me" is too vague to be armor one can be confident in, while "such and ''such ''will be deflected from me by ''this ''magic ''type" will cost health to use. All the same, one can certainly get away with increasing strength or dodging speed or various other, generally temporary, improvements. Commands Movements One of the primary uses of Name Magic on inanimate objects, one commands an object or sentient creature to move. The object or sentient creature must be specified, as well as the movement type and destination. More specific naming types allow for movement of portions of things, or movement of large or heavy things, or movement over long distances. It has been theorized that one can move things in time, but there have been no discernible successes yet. So far: Moving backward in time causes the knowledge that one's grandmother had sex several times to suddenly appear in mind and refuse to leave for the amount of time backward that was specified. Moving forward in time causes the object or person to sit there until the specified time, when it will drop on the caster's head while never leaving the spot it was originally in. Outside observers have verified that objects do not move or seem to be magically changed in any way. Transformations These require a deeper Name to use, but generally one can transform an object or sentient creature into what is described. To get more specific outcomes, one must use more specific Names. Transforming objects into concepts typically destroys them, but leaves a strong mental impression of the concept in question. On occasion this has been used to determine the Ideal Name of concepts or objects. Imbuing objects/attacks/elements Imbuing Weapons One of the earliest uses of Name Magic in combat, the custom of naming weapons became very powerful when the name could improve the weapon. Typically done with runes, the spoken version is either more temporary or far more intimate. One can call a stick "''Mountain-crusher" (takes a full turn) and gain some improvements (increases damage against armored foes, +str while using that weapon), but they will only last the duration of a battle. Sometimes, not even that long, as stories of weapon enchantments failing in the middle of a decisive battle, requiring the protagonist to fight smarter are common. The other way is to have only one weapon that one relies heavily on, to the point where that weapon is only thought of by name by the user. At that point the actual name only directs the power somewhat, (no-name swords will still be very dangerous if continuously thought of as "My Sword"), and the abilities will typically last as long as the mental association does. The longer and fiercer the association, the more powerful the weapon. Legendary weapons of a city or culture (almost always runed by that point) are ridiculously powerful in the hands of anyone who, for lack of a less cliched term, believes strongly in the weapon. Legendary family weapons have similar properties, though due to less formalization of power, they often become somewhat sentient and can spontaneously become more dangerous. Imbuing Attacks/Elements Most codified martial arts have techniques, which ultimately are sets of movements that are repeated due to great effect on multiple opponents throughout history. Unfortunately these set movements cannot be Named. Perhaps it is due to the minor differences from person to person, and use to use, but it simply doesn't work. This is not precisely true for elemental spells, as you can simply cause a spell to become permanent - turning a hand permanently into a rotating series of blades, or constantly having a sense boost. While the former is a bit extreme (with people who would do that anyway), the latter is sometimes practiced. Further, you can imbue a spell in a similar way to imbuing a weapon. For example, there was once a fire user fond of super-heating his hand (or at least the air around it) and crushing his opponents' heads. He would typically create the attack, then glare at it, shouting: "All of my hate ''(extremely personal details), all of my sorrow (extremely personal details), ''and all of my pain (extremely personal details, along with any injuries sustained in that fight)!" Initially unable to perform it correctly, many battles taught him how to succeed at it, turning it into a force capable of punching a charging Ouilifant and sending it flying with a fist-shaped hole in its head. There are probably some people that might be lucky enough to survive this (plot-armor), but generally such an attack would kill anything. Mysteries The Theoretical Level of Naming, as a whole. Why oaths are typically designed against misuse even when not specified in the sentence. Time movements as a whole, considering that Chronoism and Relativity allow control over Time. How the Stitched One granted Name Magic to all the Gypsy clans. The answer to life, the universe, and everything, as asking this question keeps coming up with "42" no matter how deeply Named the sentence is. Category:Magic